Polyoxometalate steric hindrance driven chirality-selective separation of subnanometer carbon nanotubes
Xusheng Yang, Chao Zhu, Lianduan Zeng, Weiyang Xue, Luyao Zhang, Lei Zhang, Kaitong Zhao, Min Lyu, Lei Wang, Yuan‐Zhu Zhang, Xiao Wang, Yan Li, Feng Yang
Abstract
electron transfer and demonstrate the selective separation of monochiral (6,5) SWCNTs with a diameter of 0.75 nm by a commercially available conjugated polymer. The combined use of DFT calculations, TEM, and XPS unveils the mechanism that selective separation is associated with tube diameter-dependent interactions between the tube and clusters. Sonication drives the preferential detachment of polyoxometalate clusters from small-diameter (6,5) SWCNTs, attributable to weak tube-cluster interactions, which enables the polymer wrapping and separation of the released SWCNTs, while strong binding clusters with large-diameter SWCNTs provide steric hindrance and block the polymer wrapping. The polyoxometalate-assisted modulation, which can be rationally customized, provides a universal and robust pathway for the separation of SWCNTs.